Closed Captioning

CAPTIONING

There are two separate captioning areas: public and classroom

Any PUBLIC VIDEOS MUST BE CAPTIONED as they serve as communication of the mission of the institution and that is the language of the law (Section 508). Media Services and Marketing take care of those currently.

CLASSROOM CAPTIONING

This captioning can be more complicated because there are multiple modes of teaching. In addition, it benefits more than just those who have an issue hearing; processing disorders, sound quality, those in quiet environments, those in loud environments and more (universal design). Providing captioning also allows individuals to participate without having to identify a need.

When videos are only accessed in a class (physical or online), there is some flexibility with captioning. It is recommended, however, that all videos be captioned.

TRADITIONAL CLASSROOMS: videos shown or shared with the class (but not necessarily created by us) should have captioning availability.

ONLINE CLASSROOMS:

o Asynchronous instructors can use YouTube, Clips, or other means to create captions. Again, this is a principle of universal design.

o Synchronous videos have a couple of options, as well. We are working off of Zoom only.

▪ Live captions would require a third party vendor and a student would need to request this as an accommodation.

▪ Live transcriptions are available free for 40 minutes or less (Otter.ai)

▪ Recorded videos, it can be transcribed or captioned afterward for free.

RESPONSIBILITY It is the responsibility of faculty to caption their videos, but Disability Services is happy to assist in training and support. It is recommended that faculty caption while creating videos to reduce a reactive process to requests.

LEGAL FRAMEWORK The College has underlying legal obligations to ensure applicants, students, and members of the public are able to independently acquire the same information, engage in the same interactions, and enjoy the same benefits and services within the same timeframe as their non-disabled peers, with substantially equivalent ease of use; and that they are not excluded from participation in, denied the benefits of, or otherwise subjected to discrimination in any College programs, services, and activities delivered online.

The following pages will assist you in captioning with:

Also, please find in this document:

Accessible Content – Videos, Films & Recorded Lectures

Finding Captioned Videos

Tips to Keep Accessibility in Mind regarding Multimedia

An On-going Experience

As we learn how to better serve students online and improve pedagogical practices, new ideas and resources will surface. If you have any advice, suggestions or additions for this document, contact disability@uvawise.edu.

PowerPoint

Windows Desktop Version: All other versions will need to download the Presentation Translator add-in automatic captioning for PowerPoint (not available for Mac users). This add-in will let you save the transcript of your presentation. For instructions, visit Presentation Translator for PowerPoint help and FAQs. Watch the video on How Presentation Translator Works.

Make sure your microphone is on and working.
Open a blank PowerPoint presentation.
Select the Slide Show tab.
Select Start Subtitles.
Fill out the languages and select Additional Settings link
The Add instructional slide contains the QR Code that lets attendees see the captions on their own devices.
Select Start Subtitles.
When you are done with the presentation, you will see a box at the bottom of the screen. At the top right of that box you will see 3 dotted icon.
Select the 3 dotted icon.
Select Save Transcript. You will be prompted to save the file and it will be saved as a .txt file.

Please note: Auto-captions are often machine-generated captions with poor quality in which content is not accurately communicated to people who depend on captions. Auto-captions should be corrected for accuracy and provide equal access for everyone.

Web-Based Version: PowerPoint for the web and Microsoft Office 365 subscription has built-in automated live captions or subtitles. PowerPoint can transcribe what a person is saying and display them as captions. Note: Unfortunately, you can’t save or download the transcript.

Make sure your microphone is on and working.
Visit Present with real-time, automatic captions or subtitles in PowerPoint for instructions on how to set up on-screen captions in your slides.
Watch video Live Captions & Subtitles.

YouTube - Pre-Recorded Videos

To upload to YouTube, you will need to create a YouTube channel. For instructions, visit Create a New Channel. To add captions to YouTube videos, you must be the owner of the video.

Use the YouTube Caption Editor. YouTube automatically generates captions for most videos when they’re uploaded using speech recognition technology. These machine-generated captions are rarely if ever fully accurate. However, if their accuracy is decent and captions can be perfected with only a few minor corrections, the easiest way to correct them is to do so directly in YouTube. For instructions see the Edit Captions help page on YouTube.

The easiest way to add captions on your own YouTube videos account is:

Go to your Video Manager by clicking your account in the top right > Creator Studio > Video Manager
Next to the video you want to add captions or subtitles to, click the drop-down menu next to the Edit button.
Select Subtitles/CC
Select Add new subtitles or CC button
Decide if you want to add or edit subtitles or closed captions

Transcript: You can create a transcript of the video, upload that to YouTube and allow YouTube to sync the transcript and video.

For more ways to add captions on YouTube and tutorials:

· How To Upload Videos with YouTube Studio

· Edit Video Settings with YouTube Studio

NCDAE Captioning YouTube Videos

How do I open captions transcript?

Go to YouTube video player
Select on 3 horizontal dots located next to the Save button
Select "Open transcript"
In the transcript box, use Find or CTRL + F in your browser to search for a specific word in the transcript
Or use the timestamps to get to that point in the video

ZOOM

Can Closed Captions be added to Zoom Videos?

Zoom recordings can be uploaded to YouTube and automatically captioned. Captions will not be 100% accurate but it is a good starting point. To upload to YouTube, you will need to create a YouTube channel. Recorded sessions can also be transcribed using Otter.ai for free.

Accessible Content – Videos, Films & Recorded Lectures

Everybody experiences the world, including content they access in your online course, in their own way. That experience can be very different, depending on the device, they use, the size of the screen and how they interact with it. For example, some students read text and interpret images they see; other students use assistive technology like a screen reader because they cannot see the content. When using different devices, some students will navigate with a mouse, others with a touch screen and others by keyboard. Improving the accessibility of content is about reducing basic barriers to comprehension, such as providing alternative text for images, so that those who cannot see the images can grasp their meaning. Similarly, making captions or transcript text available for a video file can make it accessible to someone who cannot hear audio.

The delivery system for your content determines what types of accessible options are required.

Captioning third party videos and recorded lectures

The two most common video hosting sites are YouTube and Vimeo; YouTube is a lot more user-friendly and has more videos; although Vimeo has some great educational content. In both cases, you have to watch out for videos that are not captioned, or are not adequately captions. It’s actually possible for you to create captions for uncaptioned YouTube videos; doing so in Vimeo is a lot harder. So, let’s focus on YouTube first.

Choosing Captioned Videos

If you are choosing videos that have been created by someone else, make sure it is captioned. Automatic captions produced by YouTube, while seemingly convenient, actually do not meet legal requirements for accommodation purposes. That’s because captions created by artificial intelligence usually have many inaccuracies and lack punctuation and capitalization.

Checking Videos for Captions

To see if a YouTube video is appropriately captioned, click on the “CC” button on the bottom right control panel of the video. (If there is no “CC”, the video is not captioned at all, but it’s possible for you to caption it, even if you don’t own it.) As you can see in the picture below, the CC icon is underlined in red when the captions are turned on. If you click the CC button off and on, the information regarding the captions appear in text in the upper left corner of the video.

Finding Captioned Videos

If you’re searching for video content to use in your courses, you can narrow your YouTube search to just those videos that are captioned. The following three pictures show how.

Go to YouTube.com and enter the topic you want in the YouTube search bar. After you click the search button, you will see a button labeled Filter appearing in the top right (see photo below). Selecting that button opens a large drop-down menu with many options.

The first picture shows the list of videos returned from the search term “Deaf”. You can also see the “filter” option:

Screen capture image of a YouTube search result, using the search term "Deaf", and highlighting the position of the Filter function to filter results for different characteristics of the videos.

As shown in the next picture, when you click the “filter” option, a dropdown with five columns/filter categories opens; Under the Features column, select Subtitles/CC. This will then narrow your search results to only those videos that are closed captioned. Always check for accuracy before using or sharing a video:

Screen capture image of the same YouTube search result, after having selected the "Filter" option. Shows a drop-down screen with five columns, with a variety of filter options. The filter option to screen out any videos that don't have captions is highlighted.

Finally, after clicking on the “Subtitles/CC” filter, the filter dropdown disappears and your filtered search results appear, listing only videos that have a CC icon. Remember, though: this list includes videos with non-English captions, auto-captions and human-created/edited captions, so you still have to sort through them and possibly edit captions. Also, you can return to the filter button in the top left; the dropdown opens again and you can select a second filter option, such as video duration: short or long. Keep returning to the filter dropdown if you have other search parameters to add.

Screen capture image showing the search result after video have been filtered for captions; the closed caption "CC" icon is highlighted for each video, showing where it appears in the search results.